Letters for the Times in Which We Live

What do you think of this . . . is it the Christian women’s job to birth all the unused frozen eggs even if they weren’t hers? So they weren’t thrown away?
Best,

Erika

Stephen Wolfe recently wrote on X, “2% of the population demand 100% of the wars.” Was what he said appropriate, and does it at all affect your support for him and his Case for Christian Nationalism?
SOURCE: https://x.com/PerfInjust/status/1936588972467065056
A daily reader,

Samuel

Lately I’ve been reading all(?) your books on marriage and being a godly husband, and for a few years I’ve been drawn especially to your answers to letters to the editor with questions/problems about marriage and family. I think I respect your take on the biblical view and detailed application of Scripture on marriage and family more than any other voice I can think of . . . the application of your broad familiarity of the Bible . . . and especially—necessarily and only—because it comes from (you come from) a 100% Christ-centered understanding of the Bible and its application.
I also appreciate your deep and reasoned thinking/understanding of the Bible as it relates to culture.
And I have followed you to some degree on how you apply the “submit to government” passages in the Bible . . . but my conscience is not 100% convinced on all of what you say.
To be blunt, it sort of seems like to me you are looking for loopholes in the Bible where you aren’t required to obey the government in all areas. But please note: Of course, I’m not talking about where the government is requiring or prohibiting anything the Bible says . . . these things are non-negotiable . . . we must—God help us—follow Jesus—Christ—and fear Him rather than man . . . always.
But it seems to me you are looking for loopholes in obeying the government in other things.
And it made me think about husbands and wives. The wife is to submit to and obey her husband in all (Biblically lawful) things.
So here is my three-part question:
And I don’t mean these to be flippant or trivial . . . I am very much earnest and serious.
How can I expect my wife to obey me in all things, if I am (please give me a little leeway in your reading/interpretation of my use of the word “loophole”), but if I am looking for “loopholes” in the Bible for all the cases where I am not required to obey the government. If I’m not gladly submitting to the authorities/powers that be, etc. in all things . . . how can I expect my wife to submit to me in all things?
Second, could you please give me a few examples of specific laws made by the government/authorities/powers that be, etc . . . for which there is no penalty, or for which you would not be “caught” . . . Where you would obey these laws gladly, from the heart, for the sake of Christ?
And, as a silly example, let’s say they made a constitutional amendment requiring all citizens, that once a day we are to stand in our living rooms and turn around in a circle 3 times . . . Would you obey this lawful decree? . . . willingly, from the heart, for the sake of Christ? And if not, why not?
This is not a “gotcha” letter or anything like that . . . But I am looking to reconcile the teaching of Scripture about husbands and wives (and all you say about the headship of the husband and loving and understanding his wife, etc . . . Not being a tyrant, etc.), which I very much respect and hopefully have/am benefiting from… and your own views on how we should submit to government to obey them in all things.
Thank you and best wishes,
P.S. I know you have written a lot about this—the understanding and application of Romans 13, etc . . . So if you could point me to sort of a condensed summary :) . . . .I would much appreciate that too, sir. Thanks.

Robert

I hope you’re doing well. Recently, this controversy regarding the Big Beautiful Bill and public lands has officially reached my circle of friends. My family and I recently moved to Idaho from California. In California, public lands are extremely restricted. Because of conservation efforts, like the infamous smelt for example, certain people cannot even enter or do anything on public lands. Most Californians need permits to camp, fish, hike, or even hunt on public lands. Public lands are so restricted that some people can’t even walk on public lands without getting into trouble or getting fined. Of course, it depends on in which county the public lands exist. I’m not too sure how Californians are reacting to how this bill influences their public lands, but I’ve always associated government owning anything with overreach, infantilizing their citizens, as well as attempting to conserve nature while also, through the nature of conservancy programs, harming nature because of a warped sense of the dignity of human life.
However, it seems to be the opposite up here in idaho. Many of my friends and other folks in my circle who are conservative are claiming that the bill is a bad idea. It shocked me hearing that just about anybody can go up to the mountains here, cut down a tree, and put it in their home for Christmas. It also amazes me that no one really seems to need extensive permits for hunting or fishing or anything else. It’s a completely different universe up here, which is one of the many reasons why we moved. I wanted to know what your thoughts are on public lands in Idaho, and how this bill would affect public lands. I’ve heard a lot of people mention their concern about, if land were to become privatized, private companies, something nefarious like Blackrock, or even China getting involved in buying up land.
I apologize that this is so long, but I am curious, and wanted to be well-informed before I make any decisions.

ON

Since beauty is not in the eye of the beholder, but rather is an objective reality . . .
How would you answer a child, grandchild, or friend who asked you, “Why did God make me ugly?”
Imagine you’re Laban, and your daughter Leah asked you this question.

CA

I was a Christian school teacher from 1975 to 2007, and for several of those years I taught apologetics to high school students. Among our “textbooks” was Persuasions. I’m curious to know if its author, Douglas Wilson, would amend that work and/or add some chapters. The issues over which we tangle with unbelievers continue to multiply, but, perhaps, the issues covered in Persuasions may remain the principal ones for which we must give an answer. I still refer to Persuasions in conversations, especially in conversations with the younger generations with whom I worship and serve, concerning the spread of the Gospel and the Great Commission.

Frank

The most recent Christian History Magazine is devoted to the Mercersburg movement, about which I knew nothing. It struck me that these also were brothers and sisters engaged in the same battles we are, albeit this side of the Protestant Reformation, decidedly nervous about the revivalist excesses they saw. I’d be curious your understanding of them.
The other aspect that seems important to keep in mind, which it seems to me was part of the 16th century Protestant Reformation also, is scale. One’s experience growing up in an evangelical church of 50-100 people, is not the same as the experience of an evangelical church of 500 people, which is different again from the mega-church experience of a church of thousands. When secular and even so-called progressive Christians talk about “evangelicals” they often have in mind a caricature that many of those who really are some kind of evangelical would not relate to at all. We have to learn to teach the nuances in these monikers. It seems the best possible way to do that is to be the kind of evangelical that defies any comic book villain versions.

Michelle

Re: Where was your face before you washed it
“The Big Box Evangelical Church and Tire Center”. So that explains the mysterious rubbery smell. Thanks!

Roger

I am a 2024 grad from Hillsdale College and am entering my second year teaching high school history. First, I just wanted to say that I absolutely loved your talk “Where Was Your Face Before You Washed It?” at the ACCS conference. What a great way to start! Second, I will be teaching Medieval history this year, and, as a Protestant, I have a question: how should I approach teaching the Anabaptists when I have Anabaptists in my classes?
For context, I have some students who fall in the third group (Separatist Anabaptists) rather than in the second group the rest of us would have fallen into (Protesting Catholics). They refuse to memorize the Apostles Creed because it uses the word “catholic,” and they are against any sort of “union” or “common heritage” with the RCs. So basically, how do I present the Magisterial Protestant (i.e., the truly biblical) view of Medieval history in a manner that does not dilute the truth of what the Anabaptists were? I’m not afraid of stepping on anyone’s toes, but I want to be wise in how I teach these things, especially since I lack the wisdom that years of teaching experience provides.
Thanks for all your work!

JP

In Reforming Marriage, you wrote, ” So while it is true that Christians are not supposed to divorce their non-Christian spouses, this only applies if the non-Christian is willing to be married within God’s boundaries. But if the non-Christian is guilty of gross offenses (offenses that carried the death penalty in the light of biblical law), then the Christian should recognize what has already happened.”
Does this apply to a professing Christian? What if a husband is a professing Christian and a member of the church and they commit a gross sin? Is divorce still allowable? How should the church handle it if the man who is a member confesses his sin and gives voice to repentance? If it is a death penalty case, such as having sexual relations with your daughter, what options does the wife have and what obligations does the church have? Are there gross sins that put you out of church fellowship permanently?

A Struggling Pastor

That was a good conversation with Robert Netzly. Do you think it is an objective sin to own these companies that he gives bad ratings? Cant you own the stock but take exception to areas of the business that you disagree with?
His point is that owning a share is different than buying the product, but I don’t think it’s that much different. Owning a mutual fund with hundreds or thousands of companies does not give you any control over the company. It is not at all equivalent to his example of owning a video store and selling porn in the back room.
The share price rises when the company does well, so if they sell sin, you profit off the sin indirectly, but most companies aren’t overtly in that business. Instead, what taints a lot of these companies in his ratings is the financial support that they give the woke agenda, or how some of their products are used by third parties. Sometimes this is out in the open, like Target, sometimes it’s not. If you own the stock it might go up, but if you are a customer you are knowingly giving them your money which they in turn give a portion to a woke organization. How is one ok, and the other not?
To be clear, I wouldn’t knowingly buy an individual stock of a company whose main business line is abortion, porn, strip clubs, etc. anymore than I would go into an actual strip club to buy a coke, but the diversified mutual funds are different. There are thousands of companies to look into, and sometimes you can’t even find them all. For example, my employer matches contributions to a 401k fund that I have little visibility into the companies that are in those funds. Choices are large cap or small cap. Now what?
To throw a third category in the mix, is it ok to work for any of these companies? Let’s say I am a software engineer at Microsoft. If I’m good at my job, they make more profit because of me, some of which goes to immoral causes and potentially products that are used in immoral ways, and then I get a bonus from that profit too. I am profiting, just like the investor. I think I can work for them and take exception to the immoral parts without having to quit as the Office365 software engineer. No? How is this example of profiting any different than Robert’s?
I was squared away and in agreement with your position on boycott, but this one is throwing me for a loop. You could extrapolate the profit/benefit argument of his way out there and cause that same paralysis you cautioned us to stay away from. I have gone round and round on this kind of stuff over the years and am close to concluding that from now on the mental energy is better used elsewhere.

Jack

I wrote to you some time ago as someone going through a crisis in my life and believing I had a call to ministry.
I wanted to share that I have had considerable change in my life, thanks to the power of the Holy Spirit and the aid of wise counsel and guidance that He has placed in my life.
That calling given to me as a youth has not only been reaffirmed in my walk with God and in those moments where the Lord gives those peeks behind the curtain, but also sharpened and given a greater sense of awareness. I have come to recognize I’m in a period of intense growth and training and can name several strides I have made in turning around and getting on track. The struggles I have had, I realize, are things which God can and likely will use to help others who struggle also.
I’ve had very powerful experiences. While I will not go into detail for privacy sake, the Spirit guided me to someone I used to know from youth who was in need of someone to pray for them, and He gave me that honor of praying for that someone. During this time, I experienced a sort of profound suffering that is beyond my words and capability to articulate, yet a suffering that was joyfully carried. In that suffering I came to understand the mind of my Lord and the words of Paul that much more.
My pursuit of ministry has taken the form of seeking a co-vocational model—part time in a pulpit and part time in the academy. I want to study historical theology of the Medieval church in higher education—particularly that of the crusaders – and teach upon the subject. I am also very passionate to write. I have been very much driven to try and write a book in the manner of my heroes among the Inklings —Tolkien and Lewis—and have been trying to improve my craft in ‘higher language’ and writing in the hopes to be even a shred of a the faithful myth-maker that those great men were.
I understand that you have a book on ‘Wordsmithy’ and look forward to reading it among several others to that effect.
Firstly a thanks to the grace of God that enables and provides such good things, and thank you Pastor Doug for your work and your ministry. I hope that this letter is one of good news. If any prayers were given over my way, they were quite effective indeed, and I hope that I could return the favor.
Peace of Christ,

George

“But how would you handle a member when you discovered that he was using your published remembrance in his daily devotions? Reading it like it was Scripture? How would you answer his reasoning?”
We would tell him that’s a weird thing to do. I’m sure when God works in your life in a particular way you give thanks and pray to steward what he’s doing in your life properly. But it’s all subordinate to his authoritative Scripture. The same is as true for the way he still speaks as the way he still works.

Ian

A dear friend of mine directed me to your post “Singleness as Affliction,” and, based on present and direct experience, I strongly concur with the thesis.
In a similar vein, I’ve noticed you are one of the few Christian leaders I’ve found who recognizes elements of a veritable “battle of the sexes” that I sense in Christian online circles. It strikes me as a spirit I would broadly describe as anti-man, anti-purity, and anti-church. What I mean specifically is this type 1) delights in blaming men at large for all the problems (real and imagined) in Christian singledom, 2) continuously rages at the sins (real and imagined) of “purity culture” (a sentiment which increasingly strikes me as a worldly hostility toward purity in general), and 3) attacks with broad brush “the church” at large with all the gusto of a deconstructionist and/or atheist.
Some examples come to mind. In one Christian Facebook group, a fellow posted carefully and reasonably written observations of ways in which some women can and do hurt men in relationships. One hostile comment rewrote the entire piece flipping the roles, presenting the examples as ways that men in general hurt women. A comment to this comment approvingly wrote, “This is more like it!” This sentiment reflexively snaps at any suggestion women are capable of wronging men, a phenomenon you addressed in In Defense of the Billy Graham Rule (my first ebook purchase from your store, not coincidentally).
In another case, a young lady posted in a Christian singles group, enthusiastically asking others their impressions of Sheila Wray Gregoire’s The Great Sex Rescue. I shared links to two substantial Christian reviews that noted positive and negative aspects of the book. During the discussion, I remembered I had a negative encounter with Gregoire’s work before. On her blog, she quotes an excerpt from a best-selling book by a husband and wife whose ministry and example have meant a great deal to me. Gregoire maliciously presents the passage out of context in the interests of her narrative. I shared this as well, and, suffice to say, the Gregoiristas ™ did not take kindly to any criticism of their vaunted Rescuer.
In defense of the fairer sex, there were also in these discussions 1) some men making similar comments, including unbrotherly remarks to fellow guys, and 2) a handful of set-apart young ladies whose own comments reflected they do not join in this unhappy chorus.
As I mentioned, you are one of the few Christian leaders whom I’ve seen address these problems; I wish others in the church would likewise speak up. For now, I would welcome your future thoughts on the subject and encourage you to keep fighting the good fight on this front.

Jonathan

My question is: how liberal can someone get in their theology before they can no longer be considered a Christian?
I met a wonderful Christian family several years ago, who were the first serious Christians I’d seen in a long time—they homeschooled their 6 children (something very rare here in the UK), and did an exemplary job. However, more recently the dad of this family completed a theology degree and has become a universalist—of the David Bentley Hart variety (i.e. hell exists, but it’s not eternal. He believes, after Hart, that the Greek word ‘aionios’ shouldn’t be translated as ‘eternal’ but just as ‘of the age’ when used in reference to hell, so hell is seen as a time of chastisement before everyone is reconciled to Christ).
If you were to recognise Christians by their fruit, their fruit is very good—these friends have a good marriage, lovely respectful children, well-ordered lives, regular devotions, and so on.
So I’m wondering how progressive/liberal can you be in your theology but yet still be a Christian? Or how many false beliefs cancel out true faith? In episode 1716 of ‘Ask Pastor John’, Piper answers this same question, but focuses on those who say they’re Christians but who believe homosexuality isn’t a sin. He says that these people cannot be considered Christians because they are encouraging people to do things that actually stop others from inheriting the kingdom of God (by their commendation of such behaviour)—as per 1 Cor 6:9-10. So they are jeopardising the salvation of others by their beliefs, and so cannot be called Christians.
But what would you say in scenarios like this, where the beliefs aren’t encouraging people into the sins in the list in 1 Cor 6:9-10—namely sexual immorality, idolatry, adultery, homosexuality, thieving, greed, drunkenness, reviling, swindling . . . what criteria do you use when someone’s beliefs are heresy but not leading to these sins?
Any thoughts you have would be much appreciated.

Lucy

Thank you for your faithful ministry to us men striving to live out God’s design in our families. I have two questions related to my wife I’d love your input on:
My wife struggles with a great deal of anxiety/depression and severe emotional volatility surrounding her cycle. When her emotions are heightened, the peace in our home is completely absent and replaced by a very quarrelsome spirit, screaming at the kids and a lack of the fruit of the Spirit. I personally believe she struggles with these things to a greater extent than most women. I have found that trying to shepherd/teach her during the periods of heightened emotions is unproductive, so I’ve chosen to try to discuss these things when she’s more sober-minded. In those moments, she takes ownership, repents and commits to striving to walk in the Spirit. As soon as the next part of her cycle starts, it’s back to what I described before. Typically 1 bad week followed by a decent week, then cycle resets, fairly steady pattern for our 9 years of marriage. Do you have any advice on how to shepherd and teach her about handling these things according to the model of a Godly husband who desires to gladly assume the responsibility for his family, yet feels ill equipped to do so? In the early years of marriage I reacted in anger and harshness or became overbearing or demanded quick outward change without addressing her heart. I’ve regularly repented of those things and have experienced growth in that area as a husband, yet even now I find myself at a loss for how to better help her understand how to walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh during this time. Would appreciate your usual thoughtful and Biblical input on this.
My wife also struggles greatly with our almost 2-year-old boy. After having a daughter first, she became accustomed to a relatively easy child-rearing experience as our daughter could sit on our laps for hours reading books, snuggling or just talking. I’ve established the clear expectation that a boy should be raised differently and that he needs to run around, get banged up, take risks, etc. In principal she has always agreed, but in practice she is quickly exasperated by his high energy levels and regularly reacts with strong angry outbursts against him. And I know with him being less than 2-years-old, the most intense season of his boyhood is still ahead of us. I regularly ask her to practice self control and try to verbally restrain her from intervening when I think he needs to be allowed to act like a boy. Again, she agrees in principle, but when her emotions are heightened, the principle quickly escapes her. How can I better teach and shepherd her toward the wisdom a MOTHER needs for raising a boy?

Jonny